New Year's resolutions for foodies

The holiday season may seem like the foodie's heyday, but the New Year doesn't have to mean a steady diet of steamed veggies and low-fat copycat recipes. Instead of resigning yourself to the typical rigidity of New Year's diets, here are some resolutions to make 2016's culinary adventure a great one.

 

 

1. Keep It Healthy - But With Flair

Healthy food gets a bad rap, but there are plenty of ways to stay healthy without sacrificing fun or flavor. Plenty of ingredients pack a flavorful punch without adding a ton of calories, such as lemon juice, balsamic vinegar, sriracha, and roasted garlic. Cooking methods like baking, steaming, and even smoking can take away the grease of frying. Experiment with nut milks and nut purees instead of cream if you're cooking for people with cholesterol concerns, and try moving from butter to healthier fats such as olive oil, coconut oil, or even avocado. But most importantly, learn the pros and cons of your food, as well as the flavor and texture profiles, and use each one to its strengths.

2. Learn to Cook for Dietary Restrictions

The CDC recognize food allergies as a growing concern in food safety and public health. Whether you're cooking for someone with a serious medical condition like celiac disease, diabetes or a nut allergy, or someone with important religious concerns like keeping kosher or halal, knowing where to get safe ingredients, how to prepare them, and how to make substitutions when necessary can get you a lot of appreciation. And if you can learn how to make a tasty gluten-free bread with a delectable crumb, you might just make some new best friends.

3. Try an Unfamiliar Ingredient

As peoples' sense of culinary adventure grows, it's becoming easier and easier to get ahold of ingredients that haven't made their way into the American cooking mainstream. Take a look around the next time you're at a supermarket, or hop into a specialty store or ethnic grocery. What could you do with gjetost, a Scandinavian caramelized cheese? Or perhaps this year is the year to try buffalo meat in a chili or meat sauce: it's sweeter and richer than hamburger, but much leaner as well. Or you could visit the closest Asian grocery and find real, fresh ramen noodles, and learn what ramen is supposed to taste like when it's not made from a $.25 instant noodle packet.

4. Use a Familiar Ingredient in a New Way

Black bean brownies? Caramel corn with balsamic caramel? Grilled cheese sandwiches with slices of apple? Olive oil on vanilla ice cream? Goat cheese cheesecake? Chocolate and olives? Why not! American cuisine trains you to expect certain flavor pairings and profiles, but you shouldn't let that blind you to all the possibilities out there. When it comes to the many variations of sweet, savory, sour, salty, and bitter, what does your own instinct say? How well do you understand the science of taste? Keep an open mind and a curious tongue, and you might surprise yourself.

5. Take your Cooking on a Worldwide Tour

You may have a favorite Mexican or Indian recipe you can pull out for special occasions, but what about the dishes you can't find in restaurants? Track down recipes like Senegalese jollof rice, Nigerian egusi soup, Brazilian acaraje, Pakistani kulfi, Czech kolache... the possibilities are as diverse as the people of the globe. In fact, you could open up an atlas and do a quick search to find what the people of any given region like to eat, or take it a step further and learn about their traditional flavor pairings, holiday meals, daily diets, and philosophy of food. With those recipes in your repertoire, you'll always be able to make a conversation piece.

6. Get Professional with Culinary School

If you love cooking and baking, maybe this is the year to make a career out of it. Culinary school could put you on the path toward your dream job. From university campuses to cruise liners, qualified chefs have diverse opportunities to do what they love to do, and with a year-round, you could earn an Associate of Applied Science Degree in Culinary Arts in as little as fifteen months! Read up on the program or just contact ECPI University to learn more about it. It could be the Best Decision You Ever Make!

Learn more about ECPI's College of Culinary Arts TODAY!

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